How would everybody feel if I closed the forums to new people, possibly only allowing donor access?

I'm pretty tired of maintaining them and I'm almost 100% sold on the idea. So if you've got any good reasons why I shouldn't do this or clever alternatives, please post them here soon.

I like the donors only idea.

Incidentally, it wouldn't just be donors only, but it would definitely be donors first and then invite only.

Do what you have to do. I'm kind of out of suggestions/alternatives, and cleaverness isn't my game.

Sounds good.

As a newbie myself, I hate to see the forums closed off to the novices completely. I would not have donated if I hadn't posted some comics and gotten a little positive feedback (thanks mmyers and scyess).

However, it's your site, and ultimately your call.

How about authorizing a few trusted members as moderators? Would that ease any of the burden? I know I am new, but I would be willing to help if I can.

Is there any way to limit the number of posts or comics created? Maybe donors have unlimited usage, non-donors only get a fixed number of comics and/or posts per day/week/month?

The problem with moderation is finding people who will stay at it 24/7 and that I can trust. It's a shitty job all around.

The other issue is that I wrote these forums and they have no moderation functions other than the stuff that I wrote for myself. I would have to write some sort of moderation system and that'd be the most work out of all my options.

I would like to make it easy for trusted users to invite other people to the forums.

I realize that this will probably shut the door on a lot of potentially really great users and probably some donations, but lately it's become a huge drain on my time and energy to keep the forums running.

What do you mean by "maintaining them"? Isn't most of it automated? Are you talking about deleting spam and other undesirable posts and moving misplaced threads or is there more manual labor than that required?

Here's another alternative that may or may not help: Restrict access to all of the current forums and add a new, single, open-access forum for non-donors (or leave RMDC open, since it is the most used by newbs). That would narrow the scope of newbie-related maintenance (unless I am misunderstanding what the problem is). Then again, that would require dealing with variable permissions, so it probably wouldn't be an easy solution. I dunno.

Being all-inclusive has definite pros (democracy, new blood) and cons (sociopaths, Devin), and being exclusive has definite pros (order, peace) and cons (stagnation). Do whatever you think is best, but I'd also like to request that we leave a flaming bag of poop on Gabe's doorstep.

What if only one or two forums were open to all? Would that significantly cut down on the upkeep?

I wrote a whole white paper on social groups within SC then realised my opinion boils down to:

Brad, that sounds like a good idea for both you and us users. I endorse it 100%.

I kinda like Wirthling's idea. Is that any better? - Making the site restricted except for RMDC? that wasy only donors get to enter contests, make suggestions, etc. Or is that just as much work as the current situation.

I have to say again that ultimately, its your site and you can do whatever you want. I think it's nice that you asked for input, but I am sure that most of us will support whatever you decide.

Just a question - if a donor has aliases, would the aliases be blocked as well? If so, that would eliminate things like the Mystery Cup.

:(

It's not my fault I'm poor.

I can see it possibly being a good idea. It'd definitely bring the bandwidth bills down.

Does this mean that if they do pay that we have to pay attention to the crap they post? Seeing as how I don't have time to moderate nor do I have a better suggestion, you've got to do what you've got to do.

I will say, as an aside, that if I didn't know what i was missing (forums and such) I might not have been as a quick to donate. I thought that everyone was cool and I wanted to be down with them.

RMDC is good for all, it allows us to spot and enjoy and get to know new talent. Bug Reports should also be for everyone -- a non-donor may see something that needs to be fixed.

If you go to such a scheme, you should start an open "Help" forum as well.

I like the idea of keeping one or two forums open to everyone.

Bandwidth isn't really the problem, so the forums would still be readable by anyone. Users just couldn't post unless they had a flag set in their user record.

The flag would be independent of the donor flag. So if somebody donated but was a big idiot in the forums, it would be easy to throw them out. Donating will not guarantee you permanent forum access.

Aliases would be excluded from the private forums, unless of course they get invited or donations are made in their name. Aside from possibly the Mystery Cup, I can't see how they'll really be missed.

Kaufman: what would the help forum be for? Help new users with site issues?

I'm pretty much sold on this idea and will probably work to put it together and online as soon as I can.

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Aliases would be excluded from the private forums, unless of course they get invited or donations are made in their name. Aside from possibly the Mystery Cup, I can't see how they'll really be missed.

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Maybe Comic Competitions stays open too.

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Maybe Comic Competitions stays open too.

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well, if you are going to have Bug Reports, RMDC and CC open to everyone, then what is the point of limiting. Those are really the only 3 formus that everyone uses a lot.

I would say RMDC and Bug Reports stay open. In order to participate in a CC you have to be a donor.

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I agree with all of Kajun's post, and I and everyone else mature enough to understand knows what you mean by the Devin remark, sure.

We're discussing the big changes on IRC right now, Brad's coding them as I post.

It's going to be good/different/interesting

I think the only forum that needs to remain open to all is RMDC, simply because that's the place where new users are spotted and could then be invited to the donors/good users area.

The rest should be closed to non-donor/good users, simply because they clog up the rest of the forums with rubbish. It happens in the CC area from time to time, too - so I don't think that should be immune from closure either...

I like it for the most part. Definitely need a couple open forums. And I should really donate again because I feel bad that it's been so long yet I'm still coutned as a "donor".

I think I'll do that either after this paycheck or the next, depending on how much cash money is left.

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And I should really donate again because I feel bad that it's been so long yet I'm still coutned as a "donor".

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aw man - no more caption mountain. And I *just* uploaded a pic.

I like what you've done, though I'm not sure about moving all the RMDC threads to "Hi I'm New."

Yeah, I want to move a lot of the quality stuff over to the new maybe higher quality RMDC.

If anyone wants to start telling me what stuff to move, that'd be helpful. I know a lot of people were using it to post series and things, which don't really belong in there anymore.

I'll start a thread for that now.

I agree the forums should be donors only.

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Yeah, I want to move a lot of the quality stuff over to the new maybe higher quality RMDC.

If anyone wants to start telling me what stuff to move, that'd be helpful. I know a lot of people were using it to post series and things, which don't really belong in there anymore.

I'll start a thread for that now.

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ive noticed the photoshop and caption moutain forums have gone

when did i miss this?